Obama Seeks More Public Support for NSA Policy, Hayden Says

U.S. President Barack Obama said the National Security Agency is hiring a privacy officer and that he’ll appoint a legal advocate to serve as an adversary to the government in proceedings before the court. Photographer: Timur Emek/Getty Images

Aug. 11 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. President Barack Obama’s call
for more oversight and transparency in the National Security
Agency’s surveillance programs shows that he wants to make
Americans “more comfortable” with the agency’s operations,
former NSA director Michael Hayden said.

“The president is trying to take some steps to make the
American people more comfortable about what it is we’re doing,”
Hayden, who also served as director of the Central Intelligence
Agency, said today on CBS’s “Face the Nation” program.

“That’s going to be hard,” because “some steps to make
Americans more comfortable will actually make Americans less
safe,” he said.

Obama said on Aug. 9 that he plans to work with Congress to
“pursue appropriate reforms” in the NSA’s authority to collect
telephone and Internet data on millions of Americans.

The president proposed changes in the Foreign Intelligence
Surveillance Court, which vets requests for electronic
eavesdropping and operates in secret. Obama said the NSA is
hiring a privacy officer and that he’ll appoint a legal advocate
to serve as an adversary to the government in proceedings before
the court.

“It’s not enough for me, as president, to have confidence
in these programs,” Obama said. “The American people need to
have confidence in them as well.”

Obama “didn’t suggest he was going to operationally change
this program” and his comments show he thinks the surveillance
programs aren’t “anything other than lawful, effective, and
appropriate,” Hayden said.

Better Defense

Obama needs to do more to defend NSA programs that have
“saved lives” and “stopped terrorist plots,” said
Representative Mike McCaul, a Texas Republican who is the
chairman of the Homeland Security Committee.

“He has not adequately explained them or defended them,
and now he’s in a bit of a mess,” McCaul said today on NBC’s
“Meet the Press” program.

Edward Snowden, a former U.S. security contractor,
disclosed the existence of surveillance programs in May and is
wanted by the U.S. for his dissemination of classified
information.

Snowden, 30, has said he believed the NSA and other U.S.
intelligence organizations violated the rights of citizens with
the scope and reach of their information collection.

‘Generational Change’

Snowden’s disclosures underscore a “generational change”
in public attitudes toward the U.S. government, Arizona
Republican Senator John McCain said today.

“There is now a large percentage of Americans,
particularly young Americans, who view Mr. Snowden as some kind
of whistle-blower when he knows that he betrayed his oath of
office,” McCain said on the “Fox News Sunday” program.

Russia granted a one-year asylum to the fugitive former
security contractor on Aug. 1 after he had spent 40 days in
diplomatic limbo at a Moscow airport.

Snowden fled to Moscow in June, seeking asylum after he
exposed the classified U.S. programs.

The Justice Department has charged him with espionage and
theft of government information for disclosing the classified
details of a phone records collection program and Internet
monitoring program that target foreign-based individuals
suspected of terrorism. Snowden’s U.S. passport was canceled
while he was at the Moscow airport.

Espionage Charges

Snowden faces as many as 10 years in prison on the theft
count and 10 years on each of two espionage charges.

“We have visas, we have a date, which we won’t disclose
right now because of the frenzy,” Fein said.

Snowden “has spoken the truth” and wouldn’t receive a
fair trial if he voluntarily returned to the U.S., Lon Snowden
said on the ABC program.

U.S. political leaders, including members of Congress, have
made “absolutely irresponsible” statements about Edward
Snowden that have “poisoned the well, so to speak, in terms of
a potential jury pool,” Lon Snowden said on the broadcast.

“Where my son chooses to live the rest of his life is
going to be his decision, but I would like at some point in time
for him to be able come back to the U.S.,” he said.

Senator Robert Menendez, a New Jersey Democrat and the
chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, said that Edward
Snowden is “a fugitive who deserves to be in an American
courtroom, not in asylum in Russia.”

“I believe he would have gotten a fair hearing,” Menendez
said on ABC’s “This Week” today.